1. A group of university students from Brazil have been given the job of discovering and locating all the waterfalls in their country. It is not easy because very often the maps are not detailed. The students have to remain in water for long periods of time. Every day they cover a distance of 35 to 40 kilometers through the jungle, each carrying 40 kilos of equipment.

2. For many years now, mail-order shopping has served the needs of a certain kind of customers. Everything they order from a catalogue is delivered to their door. Now, though, e-mail shopping on the Internet has opened up even more opportunities for this kind of shopping.

3. Another generation of computer fans has arrived. They are neither spotty schoolchildren nor intellectual professors, but pensioners who are learning computing with much enthusiasm. It is particularly interesting for people suffering from arthritis as computers offer a way of writing nice clear letters. Now pensioners have discovered the Internet and at the moment they make up the fastest growing membership.

4. Shopping centres are full of all kinds of stores. They are like small, self-contained towns where you can find everything you want. In a large centre, shoppers can find everything they need without having to go anywhere else. They can leave their cars in the shopping centre car park and buy everything in a covered complex, protected from the heat, cold or rain.

5. Not many people know that, back in the fifties, computers were very big, and also very slow. They took up complete floors of a building, and were less powerful, and much slower than any of today’s compact portable computers. At first, the data they had to process and record was fed in on punched-out paper; later magnetic tape was used, but both systems were completely inconvenient.

6. Potholing is a dull name for a most interesting and adventurous sport. Deep underground, on the tracks of primitive men and strange animals who have adapted to life without light, finding unusual landscapes and underground lakes, the potholer lives an exciting adventure. You mustn’t forget, though, that it can be quite dangerous. Without the proper equipment you can fall, get injured or lost.

7. Substantial remains of an octagonal Roman bath house, probably reused as a Christian baptistry, have been uncovered during a student training excavation near Faversham in Kent. The central cold plunge pool was five metres across, and stood within a structure which also had underfloor heating and hot pools, probably originally under a domed roof.

Before the Hubble Space Telescope was launched, scientists thought they knew the universe. They were wrong.

The Hubble Space Telescope has changed many scientists’ view of the universe. The telescope is named after American astronomer Edwin Hubble, 1 _______________________.

He established that many galaxies exist and developed the first system for their classifications.

In many ways, Hubble is like any other telescope. It simply gathers light. It is roughly the size of a large school bus. What makes Hubble special is not what it is, 2 _______________________.

Hubble was launched in 1990 from the “Discovery” space shuttle and it is about 350 miles above our planet, 3 _______________________.

It is far from the glare of city lights, it doesn’t have to look through the air, 4 _______________________.

And what a view it is! Hubble is so powerful it could spot a fly on the moon.

Yet in an average orbit, it uses the same amount of energy as 28 100-watt light bulbs. Hubble pictures require no film. The telescope takes digital images 5 _______________________.

Hubble has snapped photos of storms on Saturn and exploding stars. Hubble doesn’t just focus on our solar system. It also peers into our galaxy and beyond. Many Hubble photos show the stars that make up the Milky Way galaxy. A galaxy is a city of stars.

Hubble cannot take pictures of the sun or other very bright objects, because doing so could “fry” the telescope’s instruments, but it can detect infrared and ultra violet light 6 _______________________.

Some of the sights of our solar system that Hubble has glimpsed may even change the number of planets in it.

Sometimes my father scares me. He can tackle something he knows nothing about, and nine times out of ten, it will come out all right. It’s pure luck, of course, but try convincing him. “Frame of Mind,” he says. “Just believe you can do a thing, and you’ll do it.” “Anything?” I asked. “Some day your luck will run out. Then see what good your Frame of Mind will do,” I said.

Believe me, I am not just being a smart alec. It so happens that I have actually tried Frame of Mind myself. The first time was the year I went all out to pass the civics final. I had to go all out, on account of I had not cracked a book all year. I really crammed, and all the time I was cramming I was concentrating on Frame of Mind. Just believe you can do a thing – sure. I made the lowest score in the history of Franklin High. “Thirty-three percent,” I said, showing my father the report card. “There’s your Frame of Mind for you.” He put it on the table without looking at it. “You have to reach a certain age and understanding,” he explained. “That’s the key to Frame of Mind.” “Yeah? What does a guy do in the meantime?” “Maybe you should study. Some kids learn a lot that way.”

That was my first experience with Frame of Mind. My latest one was for a promotion at the Austin Clothing Store. Jim Watson had a slightly better sales record and was more knowledgeable and skillful. Me, I had Frame of Mind. Jim Watson got the job. Did this convince my father? It did not. To convince him, something had to happen. To him, I mean. Something did happen, too, at the Austin Clothing Store. My father works there, too. What happened was that Mr Austin paid good money for a clever Easter window display. It’s all set up and we’re about to draw the curtain when we discover the display lights won’t work. I can see Mr Austin growing pale. He is thinking of the customers that could go right by his store in the time it will take him to get hold of an electrician.

This is when my father comes on the scene. “Is something the matter?” he says. “Oh, hello, Louis,” Mr Austin says. He calls my father “Louis.” Me, Joe Conklin – one of his best salesmen – he hardly knows. My father, a stock clerk, he calls “Louis.” Life isn’t always fair. “These darned lights won’t work.” “H’mm, I see,” my father says. “Maybe I can be of service.” From inside his pocket comes a screwdriver. Mr Austin looks at him. “Can you help us, Louis?” “No, he cannot,” I volunteer. “You think he’s Thomas Edison?” I don’t intend to say that. It just slips out. “Young man, I was addressing your father,” Mr Austin says, giving me a cold hard look. My father touches something with his screwdriver and the display lights go on.

What happened next was that the big safe in Mr Austin’s office got jammed shut with all our paychecks in it. From nowhere comes my father. “Is something the matter?” he says. “The safe, Louis,” Mr Austin is saying. “It

won’t open, I was going to send for you.” “H’mm, I see,” my father says. “Can you help us, Louis?” Mr Austin inquires. I start to say he cannot, but I stop myself. If my father wants to be a clown, that’s his business. “What is the combination of this safe?” my father says. Mr Austin whispers the combination in my father’s ear. Armed with the combination, he starts twirling the knob. I can’t believe it: grown men and women standing hypnotized, expecting that safe door to open. And while they stand there, the safe door opens.

“Go ahead, say it was luck, my opening the safe today,” my father says. “OK,” I reply. Then I tell him what I saw in the faces of those people in Mr Austin’s office: confidence and trust and respect. “The key to Frame of Mind is you have to use it to give support to those who need it when there’s no one else to save the situation. Otherwise it will not work.”

A15. The narrator thought that his father

1) believed that he was the luckiest man in the world.

2) was a knowledgeable and highly qualified man.

3) succeeded in almost everything he did.

4) didn’t mind being called a lucky man.

A16. In paragraph 2 “I had to go all out” means that the narrator had to

1) take the civics examination one more time.

2) take the civics examination in a different school.

3) try as hard as he could to prepare for the exam.

4) find somebody to help him pass the exam.

A17. They didn't promote the narrator because he had

1) proved less successful than Jim.

2) sold few records.

3) no Frame of Mind.

4) not reached the promotion age.

A18. Mr Austin was in despair because

1) the curtain wouldn’t draw open.

2) he couldn’t find an electrician.

3) the display had cost him a lot of money.

4) he was likely to lose some customers.

A19. When Mr Austin called the narrator’s father “Louis” the young man felt

B4. Mr. Jones and Mr. Brown worked in the same office. One day Mr. Jones said, __________________ pleasantly to Mr. Brown: “We are going to have a small party next Monday evening. Will you and your wife come?”

SMILE

B5. “That’s very kind of you. We are free that evening, I think. But I __________________ my wife and ask her”.

CALL

B6. Mr. Brown __________________ into the other room and telephoned.

GO

B7. He __________________ very much by his telephone conversation.

SURPRISE

B8. When he came back Mr. Jones asked him, “__________________ (you) to your wife already?”

SPEAK

B9. “No, she __________________ there when I phoned. My small son answered the phone. I asked him, “Is your mother there?” And he said, “She is somewhere outside”.

NOT BE

B10. “Why is she outside?” I asked. “She __________________ for me”, he answered.

B11. Going for a walk is the most popular leisure activity in Britain. Despite its high population density and widespread __________________, the UK has many unspoilt rural and coastal areas.

URBAN

B12. Twelve National Parks are freely accessible to the public and were created to conserve the __________________ beauty, wildlife and cultural heritage they contain.

NATURE

B13. Most of the land in National Parks is privately owned, but administered by an independent National Park Authority which works to balance the expectations of __________________ with the need to conserve these open spaces for future generations.

VISIT

B14. The UK also works to improve the global environment and has taken global warming __________________ ever since scientists discovered the hole in the ozone layer.

SERIOUS

B15. In 1997, the UK subscribed to the Kyoto Protocol binding developed countries to reduce emissions of the six main greenhouse gases. The Protocol declares environmental __________________.

PROTECT

B16. Nowadays British __________________ are taking part in one of the largest international projects that is undertaken to protect endangered species.

Tracy was as excited as a child about her first trip abroad. Early in the morning, she stopped at a A22 ______ agency and reserved a suite on the Signal Deck of the Queen Elizabeth II. The next three days she spent buying clothes and luggage.

On the morning of the sailing, Tracy hired a limousine to drive her to the pier. When she A23 ______ at Pier 90, where the Queen Elizabeth II was docked, it was crowded with photographers and television reporters, and for a moment Tracy was panic stricken. Then she realized they were interviewing the two men posturing at the foot of the gangplank. The members of the crew were helping the passengers with their luggage. On deck, a steward looked at Tracy’s ticket and A24 ______ her to her stateroom. It was a lovely suite with a private terrace. It had been ridiculously expensive but Tracy A25 ______ it was worth it.

She unpacked and then wandered along the corridor. In almost every cabin there were farewell parties going on, with laughter and champagne and conversation. She felt a sudden ache of loneliness. There was no one to see her A26 ______, no one for her to care about, and no one who cared about her. She was sailing into a completely unknown future.

Suddenly she felt the huge ship shudder as the tugs started to pull it out of the harbor, and she stood A27 ______ the passengers on the boat deck, watching the Statue of Liberty slide out of A28 ______, and then she went exploring.